If there any other newbies to bee keeping as well as new to flow like me, I suggest that when you buy your flow setup that if you have a wintertime that you also buy 1 extra brood box. Flow should should suggest this to you based on what geographical zone you live in. Kind of like looking at what zones certain plants will grow good in. Anyway, just saying. Would have been nice to have bought all the first time.
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I can see what you are saying, especially as Flow describes it as everything you need except for the bees. However, no other hive manufacturer (that I have used) tells you how many boxes to buy. That includes Kelley, Brushy Mountain, Mann Lake and Bee Thinking. Even when they sell you a “full kit”, they don’t explain that you may need extra boxes. I suppose they are just assuming that you will read and get local knowledge yourself. I am not saying that this makes it the right thing to do when selling hives, just that it is standard practice.
Flow has matching extra brood boxes and they are cheaper than other sources:
https://www.honeyflow.com/shop/flow-supers/brood-box-cedar/p/193
I can see that it might be nice to avoid the cost of a second shipment too. However, the delay probably won’t make much difference, as your bees will take a while to fill the first box while you wait for the second one.
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Maybe flow should be the first to recommend it. It would only mean more sales for them because, had they recommended it, I wouldn’t have thought twice, I would have just bought it.
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Does flow have a suggestions category?
Buying a second brood box? What about buying the second hive? And the third, fourth and fifth? They didn’t tell me about that either!!!
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Did you get hooked snuggly? What do you do with all that honey?
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I’ve been called a lot of things in my time but never that!
Stoopid autocorrect eh?
All that honey? All 20 kgs we harvested this year? 
We have had no problems selling and giving it away to friends and family. Next year, my third, we should have labels and jars and I’m sure it won’t last long.
We haven’t had huge flows up here the last 2 years so wouldn’t expect more than 10kg per hive in future. We would normally consume approx 5kg per year.
With my growing experience I fully expect all 5 colonys to survive through winter and doubling in spring and selling the splits.
We only need one brood box here so buying 2 could have been a waste of money. Having extra kit always comes in handy, in fact it has seemed that every time I have bought an extra hive, just in case, and painted it another colony comes my way. I’m too scared to buy more gear now as I’m already over beed!
Fact is, proper research needs to be done when entering a new field. This field, beekeeping, has lots of variables, very few rules set in stone, different area different rules, different beekeeper different rules and so on. With proper research you should have a plan before even taking that step of buying a hive, sometimes you may feel it’s not actually your thing checking and caring for colonys on a regular basis.
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I live in the suburbs of Chicago. As you’re probably aware, it gets pretty cold here in the winter. I got my bees in last weekend and things seem to be off to a good start so far. I have a good mentor, but he’s never used a Flow. From what I can tell, I need to add another box so my bees can survive the winter. This post says add a 2nd brood box. From what I’m reading, it seems like it makes more sense to add another super that you’re robbing from time-to-time, but that I should leave honey in both supers at the end of the season for them to feed on throughout the winter.
Can someone clear this up for me? Should I be adding another brood box or another super? If another super, do I need to outlay for another set of flow frames?
Thoughts?
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Yes. For your next hive. 
The Flow system is purely for harvesting honey. Everything else remains the same as traditional beekeeping. Your mentor would know the standard requirements for your location and the Flow frames simply replace the frames normally harvested.
Hth.
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Hey skeggley, yes I have been doing a lot of research, finally made the jump. Just installed my first nuc. It was really cool.
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Tell your mentor that you should be managing your Flow hive exactly as they manage an 8-frame Langstroth in your climate. That is what the Flow hive is based on. The only difference is in the method of extraction of excess honey.
With that in mind, I guess we come down to semantics. I would add a second box which you are going to leave for the bees no matter what. In other words, you would never take the honey stored in it for yourself. I call it a brood box, because I put it under the queen excluder and let her lay wherever she chooses. I would also let them fill that before I add any super from which I intend to extract honey - Flow super or traditional super, same rule. Flow suggests something different, but I profoundly disagree with them, on the grounds that the health of the colony comes before my greed for any excess honey, and I want to make sure that they have enough stores for overwintering.
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Is a second brood box more of a regional thing? I live in Central Texas, while we can get in the teens in winter, its normally one or two days and then we are back in the 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s. This year we had like 2 days below freezing, so totally hit and miss.
Will I need a second brood box? Looks like this year with all the rain we are going to have a great season especially if the rains keep coming keeping.
I’m not getting my bees until about May 8th so Ill have a late start and will just be building the hive strength this year.
I would ask your local bee club. Most places that are not tropical or subtropical use double deeps for brood in the US.
This one comes with two brood boxes. (Don’t shoot the messenger 
)
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That’s what I saw. I think flow might soon be adjusting their price. As far as quality, I’ve had to fix a couple of things on my flow hive so far. For the price that I paid, I should not have had to of done that.
Hi all I live in the Caribbean and new to beekeeping.my hive is strong after feeding so I placed a super on. I am now reading I should add a brood box. Should I remove the super and add the brood box. Pls. Advise
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Last time I checked, Caribbean was tropical, so you probably don’t need the second brood box. I would just chill and pour myself a pina colada!
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Sounds cool, so let me understand the second brood box is only for temperate countries. Does the same apply to supers , when the super is 80% complete I add an additional super. Thanks much for the info
You would if it was not a Flow super. If it is a Flow super, just drain the capped frames.